US PGA Championship: Katayama effort pays off

Measured performance: Shingo Katayama sizes up a putt on the 13th green

By Lewine Mair

9:27PM BST 17 Aug 2001

SHINGO KATAYAMA, in cowboy hat, rode into an early lead on the second day of the US PGA Championship at the Atlanta Athletic Club, tacking a 64 to his opening 67. He overtook Phil Mickelson, who pulled up on eight under to his nine under, and he overtook South Korean K J Choi, a hugely gifted performer whose first golfing hero was none other than Ian Woosnam.

The 28-year-old Katayama, who was itching to take a photograph of the leaderboard, said that it was not just down to luck that he was at the top. "I have made a lot of effort."

Though the 30-year-old Choi said, via an interpreter, that Korean women golfers are pushed by their parents, he has done it all for himself. As a child, he saw golf on television and thought this was the game for him. Then, having decided that Woosnam had a physique not too different from his own, he tried to copy the way he swung.

Eventually, Choi dropped Woosnam in favour of Tiger Woods, whom he worships just as he himself is worshipped in Korea.

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Choi may not have too much English on which to draw, but his description of the second he under-clubbed at 13th could not have been more apposite. "I hit a hungry ball," he said. When he dropped what was his third shot in his first four holes at the 13th, he said his prayers and, thereafter, the birdies flowed.

Lee Westwood and Colin Montgomerie were similarly cut-conscious, with both rising to the challenge and handing in second-round 68s. For Westwood, this added up to 139 and for Montgomerie, a level-par 140.

Where Woosnam was concerned, it was a case of having to hang on after an outward 32. As for Montgomerie, he had a major task on his hands after playing the second half, his first, in 38.

Then four over par and being added to the list of those who were shaping to miss the cut, he proceeded to come home in 31. "Probably the most courageous nine holes I've played all year," he said.

"The way I drove and putted over the last few holes gives me confidence for tomorrow," he said, before adding, "Thank heaven's there is a tomorrow."

The last thing he would have wanted would have been to sit twiddling his thumbs until next week's WGC Championship in Akron.

Andrew Oldcorn was another Scot to come up trumps. Having opened with a 73, the winner of this year's Volvo PGA Championship had a second-round 67 for his 140 aggregate.

The circumstances were hardly the easiest in that he was playing alongside Bob Wilkin, a club professional, whose opening round had been an 86.

At the 11th, when Oldcorn sat down for a rest, he had to move almost straight away as Wilkin called to say he would be hitting out of the woods in his direction. Oldcorn moved, though he could just as easily have sat tight as Wilkin's ball shot past his nose and into the rough on the far side of the fairway.

Mark O'Meara's comeback was the most impressive. After a first-round 72, O'Meara equalled the PGA Championship record with a second-round 63 in which the 30-footer he holed for his two at the 15th was nothing out of the ordinary. As a rule, an O'Meara press conference consists of one polite note of interest in his round before a barrage of questions on his friend, Tiger Woods. Yesterday there were as many as six O'Meara questions before the inevitable happened.

O'Meara did not need much prompting. Yes, he had had dinner with Woods on Thursday night and, yes, the two of them had discussed Woods's opening 73.

O'Meara, who said that he had sensed in the practice rounds that Woods was not operating on all cylinders, reiterated that the player would not be human if he did not occasionally struggle with form.

He told Tiger to go out and put things to rights today and, at the same time, he told him that if things went wrong and he missed the cut, it was hardly the end of the world.

Woods stood on the first tee yesterday having never missed the cut in a major and having missed only one - the 1997 Canadian Open - in 105 starts as a professional.

Sergio Garcia was among those who failed to improve on their first rounds. After an opening 68, he had a 75, which was set to miss the cut. "A bad day," he said simply.